The invention described herein may be manufactured, used and licensed by or for the Government for governmental purposes without the payment to us of any royalties.
There are two typical methods of testing a Ka band millimeter wave (MMW) radar sensor. One is to set up a far-field outdoor test with actual targets or use corner reflector arrays that simulate targets of a certain size at a certain distance from the radar sensor. This method requires a great deal of space and is consequently unsuitable for use inside laboratories or production plants.
An alternative method is to place the radar sensor in a hardware-in-the-loop simulator facility which provides dynamic target ranging and a variety of target signatures. However, this method is prohibitive in cost; therefore, also unsuitable for use in many laboratories and production plants.
Disclosed herein is a system for generating simulated radar targets that eliminates the necessity for large outdoor test ranges and is relatively low in cost. The simulated radar target generating system provides complex targets of given simulated dimensions at given simulated distances when stimulated by signals emitted by the radar sensor in the sensor""s operational frequency. The dimensions are simulated by the use of multi-tap delay device while the distances (or, range) are simulated by routing the signal (in the form of light) through a fiber optic delay of a desired length.